


Lessons and Plans

by gala_apples



Category: Bandom, Cobra Starship, Fall Out Boy, My Chemical Romance
Genre: An outsider's perspective of kink, Caning, Crush, Established Relationship, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-09
Updated: 2012-07-09
Packaged: 2017-11-09 12:10:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,498
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/455309
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gala_apples/pseuds/gala_apples
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gabe takes classes to spite his ex-girlfriend, and then learns what he's learning might actually be useful.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lessons and Plans

It's misleading to say he came for shits and giggles. He doesn't laugh at any of the practices, nor does he laugh at the people. But the truth of it is he shouldn’t be here, and normally when Gabe does things he knows he shouldn’t it’s because he’s trying to squeeze amusement out of it. He can understand why William thinks he’s doing this for laughs.

The practices are not for him. He's sat in on thirteen classes. That’s over three months worth of sitting in hard plastic chairs and listening to people talk about hurting others in a variety of ways, hurting and being hurt. In thirteen classes he hasn't found a single thing he'd want to try out.

He’s obviously alone in his beliefs. Those in the audience seem so into it, they raise their hands and ask questions and volunteer for demonstrations. Which, again, isn't something Gabe is ridiculing. Everyone's got their shit they’re into. Alex watches The Food Network like they’re lessons from God, Rachel Ray the first commandment and Gordon Ramsey the seventh. William goes to every open mike night. Gabe’s fine with letting people have their thing, and in general he can even enjoy the happiness they get from it. It's just that this isn't his shit and he has the feeling the moment he tries to have a conversation with any of the people that are actually taking notes they'll know and assume he's making a mockery of it. Carden belted him the first time Gabee tried to discuss the guy’s poem after he stepped off stage, and Gabe’s made other blunders, and he just doesn't want that whole scene again. So he doesn't talk to anyone. Since he hates being mute in groups it makes the whole thing doubly awkward for him.

The presenters are throwing him off too. Gabe's in college, he's used to looking at every person and conversation through sex tinted sunglasses. In any given group discussing sex Gabe wants to get with one of them, possibly because the type of people he hangs out with enough to have that sort of conversation with are all his type anyway. But in thirteen weeks there have been a half a dozen presenters and none of them have been Gabe's type.

He shouldn't be coming, really. He doesn't belong here and sooner or later he's gonna be the asshole that calls something someone really enjoys creepy or nasty and then he's going to have to kick his own ass. Gabe doesn’t put up with intolerance, not even his own. He’s got too much pride to back down though. When he was with Elisa at the point where it was over but neither of them were willing to say it was over so they were just quietly spiteful, Gabe had had his birthday. Elisa had bought him a membership to a local kink collective, with a ‘friendly’ smile, informing him that it might make sex with him less dull.

So it’s another Saturday afternoon, and he’s here, ass planted on a blue plastic chair like they used to have in high school, because he can’t let Elisa win. He can’t be the guy that’s too pathetic to learn about new ways of getting people off.

The whiteboard at the front of the room always has tonight’s topic in blue writing. Tonight is says ‘caning’. Gabe doesn't even know what it is, but without being able to ask the house wife beside him his mind is starting to run wild. He hopes it's not people with House-like disabilities and personas using them as dildos. Gabe doesn't think he can handle that, he’s already been to the Food class and it’s gonna be awhile before he can put grated carrot in his salads.

It’s five after four when the door crashes open and two guys come in, one bursting with apologies and what promises to be a long and detailed story about the traffic until the other elbows him in the stomach, shutting him up. The couple is gorgeous. At least, Gabe's assuming they're a couple. The weird thing about BDSM flavoured sex is a lot of times people don’t need or want to get off. It's a concept that doesn't sit well with him. The first lesson Gabe learned during puberty was it's not a relationship if you're not fucking, and it’s a lesson he holds close to his heart. One is tall and incredibly skinny, skin wrapped around muscle wrapped around bone with not a inch of fat anywhere Gabe can see. He’s got glasses and oddly shaped hair, and he could pull off twink pretty well if it wasn’t for the Apocalyptica shirt and the grubby jeans. The other is shorter and his arms are covered in tattoos, a real hardcore guy. Gabe would crawl into the pants of either of them in a second.

The shorter one puts down a hockey bag and turns to the whiteboard, scrawling out a barely legible _Pete, Mikey_. It’s pretty obvious to Gabe from the way the short one was made to do the dirty work and the way he shut up the instant the taller one touched him that the short one is the sub. It’s a game he plays sometimes now, when he’s bored. Walking down a pathway to get back to his room, or in class, he’ll eye up someone and try to guess what they’d be in bed. It’s nothing he didn’t used to do, he’s always imagined himself in bed with everyone he sees, but the last few months he’s added a dimension of dominant or submissive. He never finds out, never even really wants to know, but it does help the day move quicker.

“I’m Pete, that’s Mikey. We’re going to be talking about caning for a bit, then giving a practical demonstration, then answering questions. As I’m guessing most of you already know, caning is what it sounds like, hitting someone with a cane. There are different kinds you can get,” Pete pauses to open his bag. He spends the next few minutes explaining the differences between rattan and nylon and fibreglass, how bamboo and rattan cannot be cleaned so unless you’re fluid-bonded it’s a one cane for one person sort of deal. Something that still surprises Gabe is how pointless condoms are in a lot of these people’s lives, because they do things to each other that involves blood. Gabe used to steal condoms from the nurse's office at school years before he ever had use for them. He’s got a loving relationship with the plastic sheaths.

With words like ‘deep impact’ and ‘very strong sting’ Gabe knows that this is yet another thing he’s just not going to be doing. But getting up and walking out would be an insult to everyone in the room, and that’s _not_ okay. So he stays as Mikey takes the lead and says that most likely everyone already knows safe zones and critical zones but at least they’ve brought a fun ‘pin the cane on the zone’ game and they can talk about what works and what doesn’t after everyone has a turn.

It’s about halfway through when Gabe notices Mikey’s wrists are blue. One of the earliest classes he took had a timeline of bruises and colours they turned at different points. Gabe doesn’t remember most of it, but he's obviously been in handcuffs some time in the last few days. His arousal hits hard, and while it's a feeling Gabe's used to -he's nineteen, he gets hard multiple times a day, shit, multiple times an hour- he's still shocked. He's never gotten turned on about this, this is not the sort of thing he likes. He tamps down on it and focuses on Pete’s words about moving the cane away compared to keeping it pressed against someone’s ass.

It comes up again later. Gabe’s guessed wrong, and when it’s time for a demonstration Mikey bends over the desk at the front of the room, explaining as he does so that bending over pulls your muscles and makes you more sensitive, so beginners should probably start out lying flat on a bed or floor. And for the love of god, practice on pillows before you whack a real person! Pete swings the cane and holds it on Mikey’s skin as he grunts, and though he’s wearing briefs and Gabe can’t actually see, he imagines bruises flowering. He thinks Mikey would probably look even more beautiful if he was black and blue.

Gabe decides then that he’s going to pretend. He’s going to approach them at the end of the seminar and pretend he’s interested in finding out more, and get at least one of their numbers to text with. Because he wants to see what these men look like in bed, and this is the only way. If a caning is literally the punishment he has to suffer to get what he wants, he’ll take it.

**Author's Note:**

> Theletterelle wrote me two sequels, they can be found here [Studies](http://archiveofourown.org/series/13500)


End file.
